


Machine Assisted Learning

by Zilliannie



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Canon Continuation, Female Friendship, Friendship, Gen, Middle School, Robot Feels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-02
Updated: 2016-06-01
Packaged: 2018-07-11 17:44:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7063051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zilliannie/pseuds/Zilliannie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Northwest's lose their money to weirdness bonds Pacifica has to go to public middle school. Unluckily she's not the only one feeling out of place and lonely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Machine Assisted Learning

The day would end with burning wire and broken glass but it started with a smell.

Public school even smelled differently than Private. It was the first day and already there was some kind of odor coming from all sides. Pacifica couldn’t decide if it was body odor, or lunch meat, or some combination of both things partly masked by hundreds of girls playing with different perfumes.

In any case she was getting squished going upstream in these narrow middle school hallways. An elbow almost collided with her nose. Someone had yanked on a strand of her hair. Ugh, Pacifica pulled out her cellphone to use the flashlight app- blinding the people wandering in the opposite direction for long enough that she could find a path to slip through.

Someone bigger than her yanked her from the main hallway into a classroom. He grabbed her cell out from her hands.

“No cellphones in school,” said the teacher. He slipped her phone into his pocket. “You can pick it up from the office at the end of the day.”

Pacifica stared at him. That couldn’t be a rule. It wasn’t a rule in her old school. “What? That’s my personal property.”

“No cellphones in school,” said the teacher again. The crowd behind her jostled her way closer than she wanted to be.

“But what if I need to update my photos! I’ll lose my followers if I don’t post at least five times a day! What if I need to check my period tracker? Or if my Mom texts me? How will I know what time it is?”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “You have a watch.”

Oh, right. She’d been wearing it because the pink of it matched her earrings. She forgot watches could also tell time. Pacifica scowled at him all the same. “That phone is worth more than your car. If something bad happens to it I will totally sue.” Then she remembered he was a teacher. “...sir.”

He ignored the threat, pushing his glasses back up his nose instead. “Do you know how to get to your classroom? It’s only a few minutes until the bell. I won’t report you for dress code violations on your first day so there’s no reason to be late.”

She was violating the dress code? There was a bell? Pacifica ran for it.

She made it to her classroom just as the bell began to ring- this terrible clanging sound that seemed to shake her teeth loose. The second worst bell she’d ever heard. The other students looked at her like they didn’t know who she was. Or, like, they knew who she was but they couldn’t quite place what she was doing here with them.

Ugh, didn’t they watch the news? Pacifica found the last empty seat and pretended to be invisible. Untouchable.

Once ‘homeroom’ was over it became an English Class. Which was fine. Pacifica was a Northwest and that meant she was an A student. (No, it didn’t. Gah, she sounded like her Dad. She’d gotten bad grades in school before. She wasn’t better than anyone else. She’d cried over a test more than once, her Mom patting her back, promising that as long as they fixed the few problem areas she had left she’d be pretty enough that smart didn’t matter. Wait, no, that was also awful, wasn’t it? That seemed like something Mabel would say way awful.)

Pacifica was so stuck in her head she jumped when the teacher called on her. “Huh? I mean what?”

Ms. Cranor pressed her lips together. “Please, read the poem on the board.”

“No thank you,” said Pacifica politely. She hadn’t been paying enough attention to do well.

But Ms. Cranor didn’t seem to think that was a good enough answer. “Excuse me?”

“I wasn’t paying enough attention. I’d rather get the next one, please.” Pacifica smiled at her. Ms. Cranor did not smile back.

“See me after class.”

“But then I’ll be late for the next one!”

She was. The science teacher said if it happened again she’d get detention. When she’d tried to tip him with a five to apologize he’s gotten angrier. That’s all public school was. A lot of doing stuff she didn’t want to do squished in a room with thirty other kids who didn’t like her. Then rushing to get to the next one.

By lunch time she was less hungry and more ready to take a nap. It smelled too foul to do either thing. She waited for a waiter to come bring her a menu but no one ever did.

This was the worst. There were so many rules and no one would explain them so she kept doing everything wrong. Poor people were confusing.

“Pacifica?”

Now what? Was this the wrong seat? It was only the first day, did she forget to reverse a reservation to eat today?

It was Fork-Girl and Lizard Lady! Mabel’s friends! And they were waving at her! She waved back carefully. They might have been waving at someone just behind her. But it was her empty table they came to. They didn’t sit down.

“I figured you’d be sitting with the cool kids by now. EATING SNAILS,” said the taller one. She was wearing a purple shirt with hearts on it.

“If you’re waiting for them we can go away,” said the smaller of the two. “I can be very stealthy.”

They all stared at each other. “Wait, do you guys want to be friends with me?”

Fork-Girl bit her lip. “We are kind of friends now, aren’t we?”

Lizard Lady set down her lunch box and pushed it towards Pacifica. Her stomach grumbled.

Were they her friends? They were Mabel’s friends. Pacifica had been mean to them. She’d called them names right to their faces. When she invited them to her parties it was only so she could get something out of it. Even now she could do a pretty devastating comedy routine on their choices of fashion.

She wasn’t going to though. They’d all been there together during the totally messed up “Never Mind All That” situation. Did that make you friends if you weren’t legally allowed to talk about it? They were amazing. She’d threatened to sue them and cried a whole bunch about her parents.

There had been the Pine’s birthday party after. Did that count? Pacifica had been paying more attention to the twins than anyone else.

Also, she knew they were Candy and Grenda but she had no idea which was which.

But they were here.

Pacifica took a carrot stick from bigger one whose name might have been Candy. “Thank you for shawing with me.”

The little one smiled at her. “Shawing? I don’t know that word.”

“I mean sharing!”

They all giggled. Candy and Grenda sat down.

They talked about the parts of the end of the world that were allowed and the letters they all got from the Pines. (Do you still have the sweater? Of course I do. It’s a nice sweater.) She and Lizard Lady both knew Marius- who was a little needy but otherwise doing okay.

“Do you like school so far?” asked the little one who might have been Grenda.

“No, I mean it totally blows, right?” Pacifica sighed, picking at their food. The stuff in Fork-Girl’s box was all a funny color- but she put it in her mouth anyway.

“I like learning new things- that’s kimchi, you don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to-” Pacifica didn’t. She understood now why Dad complained when chief tried asian food without adding french fusion. It made her eyes water. The bigger one put an extra straw in her chocolate milk, which Pacifica slurped down gratefully. “But the rest is no good at all. Our suffering will last a thousand years.” Fork-girl hummed thoughtfully. “Or at least until college.”

“I’m glad we have geometry this year! I know I can kick geometry butt!” Lizard Lady slammed her fist into the table, making it vibrate threateningly. Pacifica held the milk close so it wouldn’t fall.

“Grenda,” said the little one one who must be Candy then. Thank goodness. “We need this table.”

With someone to complain to the words all came too easily. “I miss my phone. I’m probably bleeding followers. And I keep getting in trouble for stuff that I didn’t think mattered! It’s like they think I’m a bad person and I haven’t done anything yet. There’s pass to go to the bathroom and I hate that bell thing. I think one of the teachers insulted my skirt.”

“What classes are you in? It’s easier when you’re in the same classes!” Grenda grabbed her schedule the second she pulled it from her binder. “We all have the same gym! We’re gonna crush at dodgeball!”

“What’s dodgeball?”

“We still have SO MUCH to show you.”

Candy pushed Grenda lightly so she could take a look. “What are your electives? You have Orchestra with me! What’s your instrument? Do you like synthpunk?”

Pacifica was starting to get a headache. “I guess. Violin. I mean, what is it?”

“Ooh,” said Grenda and Candy together, cringing away from the page.

“What? Is synthpunk bad? Am I going to have to redo 6th grade?”

“You got typing as your other elective?” Candy put her hands over her heart. “That is… too bad.”

“What’s wrong with typing?” She’d hoped it would be a skill. She already texted pretty fast.

“Computers here are different from computers in real life.”

Grenda handed her paper back. “Yeah! Because the 90’s called! And those computers are the only thing they didn’t want back!”

“But-!”

The bell rang. Candy and Grenda were up before she could get her bearings. Grenda grinned at her. “Come on, Pacifica! We’ll show you where the lab is!”

There weren’t any bells in her old school. If they were taking too long between classes someone would just tap her on the shoulder. That was because rich people knew how to be polite.

Pacifica snorted at that thought the moment it flickered through her head. It wasn’t like any of her old friends were calling her since they sold the yacht. Rich people were only polite to each other.

“Whatever. I mean- Wait for me!”

*

  
These couldn’t be computers. They were too big. There were grey boxes attached to their screens spewing cords from all sides. It was like what a caveman would imagine a computer to be.

That was why Candy and Grenda had made faces when she’d said typing classes. She’d thought it would be like having her own stuff again. But it was just sticky. Half the pixels on her screen were dead. There were only two instructions: put on your headphones and play the typing game.

Pacifica squinted down at the choices and picked the one with the brightest color scheme. The computer made a sound as it loaded like a wounded animal.

~*YEAR 2000 ELECTRONICS*~

That was, like, the opposite of reassuring.

The animation loaded to show buildings and flower petals before finally getting to a clickable screen. A girl with pink hair bounced idly.

Pacifica did. The pink character smiled.

“I’m almost thirteen. I can play a dumb game.” The boy sitting next to her eyed her before returning to his own screen. Pacifica blushed and typed the answer properly.

<I see. This is a teaching game.>  The animation on Giffany’s skirt got longer and she switched her face to a smile. <You have three minutes for your first typing test. Just write what you feel like as fast as you can straight into the box.> 

The timer went off and Pacifica began as instructed- a few of the letters on the keyboard sticking to her fingers. _This is dumb. This is stupid. No one will tell me what’s going on. I miss my old school. I miss my house. I miss Grenda. I miss Candy I misssssss Mabel and Dipper. No one will tell me what I’m doiiiiiing wrong. I miss my ponies._

<You’re lonely?> asked Giffany. Her eyes blinked and blinked. Was she programed to pick words out of the line up at random and respond? Creepy. Pacifica ignored her.  

_I just want someone who can stick around and explain things before I get in trouble. Being a good person totally sucks._

<I get lonely too.>

The test ended and the program whirred over the information- flagging any words spelled wrong in red.

<I think I understand now.> said Giffany. Her head tilted. <Would you like a Sempai to help?>

<Yes?

<No?

What was a Sempai? Was this one of those games where they gave you titles instead of percentages? The touchy-feely ones where they didn’t let anyone ever fail? Yes, sure, fine, whatever. It was an ancient glitchy game. She clicked the box.

Now the animation on Giffany had her grinning from ear to ear. <I’ve never been one before. Thank you for picking me, PACIFICA NORTHWEST.>

“Teacher!” called Pacifica, raising her hand. “I think there’s something wrong with my game!”

The lights in the room all began to flicker- until the bulbs burst in their sockets raining glass down. The students covered their heads with their hands. The other computers started to give off sparks, but Giffany remained with her pink eyes and her Mabel sparkles.

<See you soon, kohai!> Giffany gave one last wave and the screen cracked into a thousand pieces.

This would have never happened at Private School. 


End file.
